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Astronauts could grow CANNABIS on the Red Planet, hints British Mars One finalist

A budding British astronaut has indicated that astronauts on a one-way trip to Mars might be able to grow cannabis aboard their spaceship.

Ryan MacDonald, a physics student at Oxford University, is one of five Brits named among the finalists for the Mars One mission, which will send a team on a mission to settle on the Red Planet.

He suggested it may be possible to use the spacecraft’s soil-free “hydroponics” plant-growing system to grow the green stuff on Mars.

The Mars One team will not be coming back to Earth, so any spaceship will be equipped with the means to grow food – or weed.

Spaced: Ryan MacDonald with Brit astronaut Tim Peake

Hydroponics techniques are used to grow the herbal menace known as “super skunk”, an intensely strong strain of marijuana.

MacDonald’s astonishing claim came after Boing Boing journalist Xeni Jardin wrote a tweet saying the prospect of “absolutely no weed ever” would terrify her during a trip to Mars.

“You’d be amazed at what can be done with the hydroponics bay,” MacDonald tweeted in response, before signing off with a smile symbol.

Peter Reynolds, leader of the pro-cannabis campaign group Clear, said astronauts could benefit from blazing in space.

“Cannabis would be be useful to anyone embarking on a Mars mission,” he claimed. “For many people cannabis has a spiritual dimension and promotes relaxation as well as oneness with nature and other people.

“This would all be useful to astronauts when they are a million miles from home.”

The pot protester claimed little green men would be baffled by the fact that humanity has put controls on the sale of weed.

“Martians would find the 100 year cannabis ban experiment to be totally absurd,” he said. “They would be astonished to see such legal controls on a plant we have lived with symbiotically for 10,000 years.”

Scientists recently said cannabis was responsible for one in four new cases of psychosis.

We have contacted Ryan MacDonald and Mars One for comment but have received no response.